wii fit is cool… and mean

bernadette convinced (didn’t take much) me that we needed to get a wii fit. i did a quick search, and they’re pretty much sold out everywhere still. i ended up biting the bullet and paying a $40 premium on ebay to get it right quick.

so we’ve been playing lately, and it’s pretty fun, but it is also kinda mean. after you turn it on it says, “step on”, and as soon as you step on it says, “whoa”. maybe that’s just me. but it did wish bernadette a happy birthday, which was pretty nice.

but i’m off to vegas tomorrow and i’m sure it will say much meaner things when i get back.

i’ve had it with spore

okay, so i spent quite a bit of time on spore this weekend. i even got bernadette to play, since i thought the early levels were cool. however, after getting to the galaxy stage or whatever it’s called, the game pisses me off beyond belief. flying around with the mouse sucks. rotating the camera is hit or miss with the keyboard and sometimes requires trying to click on a control so small, and so right next to another control that flies you off the planet (literally), it’s extremely frustrating. i’m really not a fan of these missions where you have to fly around a planet, using a metal-detector-type beeping radar to tell you when you’re near something. the things you’re supposed to find are creatures or plants that seem to emit a yellow gas on the ground. however, often those animals are under large trees, and without good camera controls, you’re often left trying to see through gaps in the leaves, or worse. and, if the creature you’re trying to find is in the water, the yellow gas on the ground near him is also under water so you don’t see it at all!

maybe i’ve just been playing this game too much (really, only a few days). i think i’ve had it now, though. the galaxy level is vast, which makes it interesting, but it gets redundant and the controls piss me off almost more than the uncontrollable camera and too-tight-for-two-players that is lego star wars. don’t get me started on that one…

hey, i’m a top tech leader! wait, no i’m not…

this is a snapshot of my inbox from this morning. “sympa” is our internal mail list something or other. sometimes i get randomly added to various mailing lists, like “sunnyvale-managers” or “building-f” or some such. so getting added to random mailing lists is nothing new, though it does put some label on your head.

so this morning, i noticed the first email (at the bottom) that i was added to a list called “top-tech-leaders”. kinda cool, i figured, being called a “top” tech leader. then a few minutes after that, i was removed from that list. i’ve seen that happen before; someone creates a list, makes a mistake, then removes everyone from it. then 18 minutes later, i’m added to “tech-leaders” (note the lack of “top”).

for the rest of the day, i waited for the removal from “tech-leaders” and being added to “bottom-dwellers” or just “tech” some such. so far, i’m still a tech-leader.

bowling again and conservation of greatness

so tonight was the first night of bowling in our new fall season. i didn’t bowl the summer league because, well, i didn’t. i haven’t touched my bowling ball in months and was pretty nervous going in tonight fearing my right forearm falling off before the first game ended. i talked to joe for inspiration who bowled exactly one game for our team and rolled a 707 series. he said that’s what he was able to do when he hadn’t bowled for a long time.

so, i had a few warmups and it didn’t feel that great, but it wasn’t that bad. i started the game with a strike, nine-spare, strike, strike, 9-spare, then a bunch of strikes. ended up with a cool 259 and won the pot. then i blew the second game, but punched out in the 10th and won that pot (172 game). and then i sucked in the third with a 170. not bad for a first week, but it just screams of my inconsistency. or that my average should really be 171.

playing spore

so i’m now playing spore. i never really got into the sims, only playing it a few times, but i played a lot of simcity in its day. and simtower. and simant, though simant was pretty lame.

anyway, i picked up spore today, after making a half-hearted effort to get it at best buy as i drove past it yesterday. sidenote: best buy really sucks. their store organization is horrible, it’s hard to find anything, and no one is helpful. so, like i said, i picked up spore today and have been playing it for the past few hours. as with all games that have known sets of levels, i tend to play it a bit slow because i want the game to last. i made it through the cell stage pretty quickly, only dying a few times. the creature stage was certainly harder, with what i was supposed to do less clear, and enemies a lot harder. as for my creatures, i clearly became a carnivore and a pretty aggressive one at that. do people actually decide to be herbivores? and make friends with others? seems like a hunting pack is a lot more fun.

so i’m at the point now where i can evolve to the tribe state, but i first had to walk around and kill most of the other creatures on the map, mostly because i can. the game is pretty cool, though the initial experience would have been a lot awesomer if the game detected my widescreen an appropriately set the resolution. once i did that, it looked great! third-person camera control is always a bit frustrating, but the game seems to handle things pretty well.

okay, off to get some food now. on to the tribal stage another day.

anyone else playing?